


Dylan and Nicole Do a Spook

by WoodFishSpooks



Category: Original Work
Genre: Blood and Gore, Body Horror, Horror, Japanese Mythology & Folklore, Kappa, Multi, Original Fiction, Psychological Horror, Western
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-09
Updated: 2020-03-09
Packaged: 2021-02-28 22:20:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 13,706
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23074630
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WoodFishSpooks/pseuds/WoodFishSpooks
Summary: A collection of four short horror stories, written by Dylan Crites and Nicole Poissant
Comments: 6
Kudos: 19





	1. Happy Hanami

**Happy Hanami**

**Nicole Poissant**

“Come on, kids! We don’t want to be too late! Parks fill up so quickly at this time of year.” Angie held several beige, clean, burlap tote bags in her hands, trying to juggle everything she needed at once. She headed towards the waiting taxi that waited outside, her husband Joshua following at her heels like a lost puppy, folding a picnic blanket into neat sections while his daughter Amanda latched at his leg, begging to be picked up. He assured her that they would get to the park soon, helping his wife unload her full arms into the trunk. Clapping his hands, he did a quick headcount.

“Where’s Matthew?” Joshua looked around wildly, checking to see if his son had wandered into the street. Angie ran to the revolving door of the hotel, where Matthew was pushing on the glass with all his might while running at full speed. She stopped the door with her foot, leaning into one of the divided quadrants to scoop up her son, who was already throwing a fit. Both children were easily entertained but extremely restless, impatient, and wild. At the ages of three and five respectively, Angie and Joshua were fully convinced that there was nothing to be done, and eventually their kids would grow out of their untamable phase. 

“Matthew, don’t embarrass mommy, okay?” Matthew answered with a series of blubbering, incoherent noises, trying to rip off a piece of his mother’s blonde hair. Joshua and Amanda were already in the backseat of the taxi, and once everyone was properly buckled in, the driver turned, an elderly Japanese man who had learned English through years of driving around tourists. 

“Where are you four headed?”

“ _Yoyogi Kouen_ , please!” Angie read the name of the Shibuya park off of her cell phone, trying her best to pronounce it despite her thick foreign accent.

“Ah, hanami?”

“Yes! We are visiting for hanami.” 

“Of course. Let’s go!” The car started, and the busy traffic ride began.

It was early April, the best time for Japanese cherry blossom viewing, also called “hanami”. Hanami is mostly spent with friends and family at local parks, eating snacks and food together underneath the beautiful pink flowers that covered the landscape. Hanami is also a popular time for tourism, as people from abroad travel to appreciate the unique trees foreign to their own countries, along with the comfortable temperatures at that time of year. Angie was tired of living the same mundane schedule, and she decided to have her first family vacation in Japan. They were on their way to Yoyogi Park to eat lunch under the cherry blossom trees that lined the large ponds that were filled with falling petals. Sure, it wasn’t the best spot for Hanami, but Angie wanted somewhere quiet, especially where her children wouldn’t bother other visitors. 

When the park was within sight, the taxi pulled over on the side of the road, turning around while placing a hand on the headrest of the empty passenger seat. He smiled warmly at the American family, a gentle smile on his wrinkled, pale skin. He nodded his balding head in thanks when Angie handed him the payment, Joshua already unloading everything onto the sidewalk while trying to keep his kids from wandering away.

“Miss, I hope you have a good time. I don’t have anywhere else to be today, So please come to me if you have a question. I will be here.” He patted the steering wheel of his taxi twice, rubbing the aged material with his wrinkled fingers.

“Thank you so much. My name is Angie. May I know yours?”

“Please call me Takashi.”

“Mr. Takashi, thank you, thank you. We will be back in about an hour. Is that alright with you?”

“Certainly.” He nodded his head again, watching Angie wander down the hills of Yoyogi Park, her family in tow. Joshua assigned each child something to hold, the youngest, Matthew, held the blanket, while the oldest, Amanda, carried a small tote-bag filled with utensils and several small pillows. The family tried to find a mostly empty area to sit, but many were filled with people. Hanami was popular for a reason, and Angie knew that they would be unable to find a suitable spot had they arrived late.

“Joshua, I don’t see any spots.”

“I know, I know. It has to be secluded. Amanda and Matthew.”

“I just don’t want them to annoy everyone. They’re going to want to play in the grass.” Amanda watched Matthew, who was wearing an orange and green striped T-Shirt with a pair of black shorts. It wasn’t the best combination, but he threw a fit every time she tried to dress him in something that actually matched. His wild black hair, which he received from his father, was cut short at the base of his neck, slightly choppy bangs tousled across his forehead. Amanda nearly tripped on her purple jelly sandals, pink glitter ingrained into the rubber that exposed her purple painted toes. She was wearing black pants and a green shirt because she insisted that she match her little brother, whom she adored. She liked knowing that she was older than him, thinking that it gave her some kind of authority over his life. Her blonde hair was pulled up into a ponytail, loose pieces of hair framing her pale complexion. Angie was confident that they would grow up into beautiful young adults.

Angie spotted a bridge that crossed the large ponds, more cherry trees beyond the distance. Hopeful that the other side would have a more open spot for her family, she led them across the bridge, thankfully finding a large, beautiful grassy spot away from everyone else. She could see other families and friends gathered in the distance, but to her surprise, nobody could be seen this far away and this close to the river.

“Mommy? What’s this say?” Amanda was standing next to an old wooden sign, tilted to the side from years of sitting in the open. It was overgrown with weeds that jutted from nicks in the wood. White paint was shaped into Japanese characters, all unknown to the mother. Most notably, the sign had a crude painting of what appeared to be a turtle standing next to a small child, a wave of water over their heads. The sign made no sense to Angie or her husband, and neither knew what to make of it.

“The turtle and the little boy are playing in the lake. See them under the water together?” Joshua decided to make up a story in his head based on the picture, finding this was good enough to pacify his child.

“Yeah! I like them both!”

Finding a relatively flat spot in the grass, Angie laid out her picnic blanket, setting out their lunch for the day. Matthew and Amanda were desperate to eat so they would be free to play together. Amanda pulled out her cucumber sandwich, scarfing it down. She handed a sandwich to Matthew, who also began stuffing his face.

“Kids! Slow down! You’re going to get a stomachache!” Angie tried to pry the sandwich away from her daughter, but she tore herself away, scooting closer to her brother.

“Let it go, honey. They’re going to be restless if we make them actually sit down and eat for once.”

“Am I wrong, though? They’re just going to get themselves hurt.”

“Maybe letting them go play will help tire them out?”

“Gosh, I wish. I guess you make a good point, though.” Angie rubbed a hand across her face, deciding to slowly eat her own cucumber sandwich. A few minutes of silence passed, and Amanda stood up, holding her little brother’s hand tightly.

“Mommy! We’re gonna go play now!”

“Y-Yeah!” Matthew stomped his foot defiantly, and Angie waved them away. They were already off running, and Angie cupped her hands to shout to them.

“Don’t go too far! Make sure to come back when you’re done, okay?! The nice man in the taxi is waiting for us! Don’t talk to strangers! Don’t…” She sighed in defeat, knowing they were already out of earshot.

“Don’t worry about it. They’ll be fine.” Joshua patted her shoulder.

“I know. It’s nice and quiet now, isn’t it?”

“Yeah, it sure is.”

Angie grabbed two of the pillows from one of her bags, laying down on the floor to face the sky. Joshua followed suit, hands folded behind his head. The pink cherry trees shaded their view of the sun, covering them in a gentle shade. Small loose petals broke off from their flowers as a breeze passed over the earth, sending them twirling and twisting up into the air. Angie could hear the distant sounds of her children laughing, and she felt her eyes drifting shut. 

Maybe being a mother wasn’t so bad sometimes.

* * *

“Matthew, where are you going?” Amanda watched her brother dart across the way, hiding behind a tree. She followed him, unsure why his mood suddenly changed. They were just playing tag, nothing serious, but she didn’t expect her brother to move so fast.

“Noises.” Matthew peeked from around the tree, and Amanda followed his gaze. Nothing seemed to be out of the ordinary.

“You’re silly. People are talking everywhere!”

“No.”

“What do you mean?”

“The water....”

Matthew pointed to strange bubbles popping on the surface of the water. Amanda squinted her eyes to look further, but she couldn’t understand what the big deal was.

“It’s just bubbles.”

“No.” Matthew was stubbornly sticking to his spot behind the cherry tree, unwilling to budge an inch. Amanda rolled her eyes, walking to the bubbles that had now neared closer to the edge of the river. Matthew lost his voice, wanting to tell her to stop, that something felt wrong about the bubbles, but he had no confidence to speak up. Amanda’s shoes barely stepped in the river, and she leaned forward, the bubbles now about two feet away from her. She could see a murky discoloration in the water as opposed to the contrast of the surrounding blue, but this did not deter her.

“Amanda…”

A loud splash threw water everywhere, and Amanda screamed, falling backwards. She quickly backed away from the lake, scooting onto the grass, when a creature standing at about 5 feet emerged from the lake. It was mossy green in color, long arms skimming the surface of the lake with long nails. A large brown shell attached to it’s back, and Amanda looked into its wrinkly face, downturned, tired eyes accompanying a froggy frown. She thought that it might be balding, hair sticking in uneven tufts from underneath a white bowl or place-like divot that sat in it’s head. The plate was sloshing with water.

_“Kyuuri…”_ It said slowly, wandering forward. Amanda wasn’t expecting it to actually _walk out of the lake_ , and she ran over to her brother, knees shaking.

“W-What do you want?”

_“Kyuuri…onegaishimasu...”_ It repeated again. Amanda was just as confused as before, watching the water drip from it’s skin. It was holding out its hands. Maybe it wanted something?

“I’m gonna tell mom on you!”

_“Kyuuri… Kyuuri…”_

“Amanda… It’s the turtle…”

“The turtle? The turtle… from the sign! Daddy told me that the boy in sign was playing with the turtle in the lake! Maybe he saw us playing and he wants us to play with him!”

“He doesn’t…” Matthew was watching the creature closely, not trusting it. It was slimy, more human than a turtle. He didn’t care what his dad said. That creature did not want to play, but there was no way for him to stop Amanda from doing what she wanted. She was older than him, and older siblings were always right.

“Mr. Turtle! Do you want to play in the lake with me?”

_“Onegai… Onegai…”_

“Matthew! Wanna play?”

“Amanda… No…”

“Okay! We’re just going to have fun without you, then! Bye bye! Bye bye!” Amanda walked right up to the turtle, who was looking at her with watchful eyes. It held out its hands, and Amanda grabbed it. Her mom taught her to treat everyone with respect, no matter what they looked like on the outside!

“Amanda… Amanda…”

_“Bye bye! Bye bye! Bye bye!”_ Amanda walked ankle-deep into the lake, a bright smile stretched across her face, continuously waving and waving, smiling and smiling, until Matthew’s stomach dropped. The creature sank into the water, along with Amanda, whose eyes were blown wide the moment she felt a sharp tug on her legs, drowning her deep in the waters of Tokyo.

* * *

“Joshua, Joshua!”

“Hrnm…”

“Joshua, get up!”

“...What, woman?”

“Joshua, we fell asleep! The kids are still not back!” The dark-haired male groaned, stretching his arms high above his head. He sat up, rubbing his eyes, only to be greeted by Angie’s worried expression. She stood up, shouting out the names of her children, and only then did the situation dawn upon Joshua. He quickly got up, joining her search, and he looked across the river, wondering if they had wandered over the bridge while they were asleep. He walked to the edge of the water, about to call out for them again, when something caught his eye.

Were cherry blossoms normally that red?

Joshua walked along the edge of the water, eyebrows furrowed in confusion. He noticed the water flowing towards him had become darker, a reddish color swiftly being carried away. Angie saw him and ran towards him, wondering if he had figured out where her kids went.

“What are you looking at?”

“The water, it’s not blue.”

“We are supposed to be looking for our kids! Who cares about the water, Joshua?!”

“No, No, wait…” He squatted down, seeing something in the water floating towards him. He leaned forward, catching it in his hand before it could get any farther.

A tuft of blonde hair.

He held it up to Angie, and she threw her hands over her mouth, stifling a rising scream. She didn’t even glance at Joshua’s hand. He stood next to her and turned back to the water, bile rising in his throat.

_A small, severed hand, painted dark with blood._

_An eyeball that had been emptied of life._

_A piece of bone with teeth marks broken through the tough marrow._

_A kidney, small and buoyant._

_A string of intestines._

_Lungs with veins still leaking with blackened blood._

_A heart still freshly pink._

**_Amanda’s head._ **

  
  


He pulled the head out of the water, not even registering the continuous screams of his wife, who was now hunched over, violently puking on the floor. She could barely stand, hysterically wailing like something in her had snapped out of place. The head was frowning, skin torn away at the mouth, dripping blood onto his white shoes from what was left of her lips. Her teeth were missing, gums ripped apart, pink like a wad of used chewing gum. She was missing an eyeball, but the other one was still in her skull, eyelids missing from their place. Her hair was torn out in several places, irritated bleeding bald patches littered across the crown of her head forcing her hairline to recede. Strings of blonde hair, whatever was left, clung to Joshua’s hand like worms desperate to eat away at his skin. 

He cradled the head against his chest and slowly began to walk down the river, against the flow of the current, away from his wife.

Angie, smeared vomit now stuck to her mouth, ran across the river like her life depended on it, tripping on her face several times. Screams could be heard from across the river, as civilians had no doubt seen the remains of her child floating down the river. She bolted on shaking legs over the hills of Yoyogi park, skidding in the grass, fumbling back onto her feet, until _finally_ the door of Mr. Takashi’s taxi was in view. She pounded her fist on the window, and he jumped in his seat, throwing the door open. The crazed woman grabbed at the collar of his shirt, sinking to her knees, pulling him forwards.

**_“MY CHILD IS DEAD! HELP ME, HELP ME!”_ **

Takashi could see crowds of terrified people running away from the water. Mothers holding their children, teenagers holding each other’s hands, even the elderly all ran into the street, stopping oncoming traffic. They ran, screaming, as fast and as far as they could. Takashi got out of his car to look at the lake, and he saw the dark red puddle of water staining the center of the lake, spreading out rapidly. 

**_“Kappa.”_ **

“W-What?! **_What does that mean?!”_ **

“Come with me! Take me to your children!”

“My daughter is dead!”

_“You must find where she was! Your husband, make him help! We must go now!”_

Takashi briskly walked down the hill, Angie running close behind. She made sure the man didn’t fall over, since he was already so old, and she led him across the river, over the bridge, and to her picnic blanket. Her husband was nowhere to be found, but she saw a trail of blood staining the grass, dripping out of her daughter’s missing head. She and Takashi followed the trail to another clearing, and she nearly screamed at the sight before her.

Amanda’s head was abandoned on the grass, while Joshua was in the water, wrestling a turtle humanoid creature, who was obviously winning. Joshua was being choked, gargling on the shallow water that filled his nose. Matthew was crying on the floor, and Angie watched him crawl on the grass towards her. She screamed like a banshee when she realized her son was missing a leg, bleeding out across the floor. His eyes were scratched, blood trickling out of the tears in his sensitive, young flesh. She cradled her dying son in her arms.

**_“Amanda, Amanda!”_ **

_“M-Mommy is here now, sweetheart! Mommy is here!”_

**_“AMANDA, AMANDA! AMAND-D-A!”_ **

Takashi rolled up his sleeves, approaching the water where Joshua was drowning. He stood up straight, bowing his head deeply.

**_“SUMIMASEN, KAPPA SAN! EXCUSE ME, MR. KAPPA!”_ **

The kappa, unable to resist hospitality, released Joshua from its grip. It stood up straight, copying Takashi’s gesture, although not bowing deep enough to Takashi’s liking.

_“Sumimasen…”_ The kappa grumbled out a similar greeting, and Takashi stood up straight again, bowing as deep as his old body would allow.

_“Hajimemashite! Nice to meet you!”_

_“Haji...memashite….”_ Joshua coughed up water and stumbled over to his wife and child. He removed his belt and tied it around what was left of his son’s leg, pulling it as tight as he could to hopefully stop the bleeding. They watched in shock as Takashi continuously introduced himself to the kappa, until finally, he got what he wanted. The kappa bowed too deeply, trying to be more hospitable than Takashi, and spilled the water out of the dish in its head. Once the water was gone, the kappa became immobile, stuck in his bowing position. Takashi wiped the sweat off his brow and ran to the ruptured family.

“He is immobilized. He can’t hurt you anymore.”

“Mr. Takashi, what is going on?! What is that thing?!” Angie rubbed her hand across the head of her remaining child, bloodshot eyes searching for answers.

“An old Japanese legend, a kappa. When I was a child, my father told me about the dangers of the kappa. They are mischievous tricksters, and they can be very violent. They are supposed to be stories told to children to warn them of the dangers of swimming alone, to keep them from drowning. I swear from the bottom of my heart that I have seen a kappa before. I knew they were real. I saw it with my own eyes, and now, I know. I know, I know.”

“A kappa? Th-The sign… that’s what that… thing… was…”

“Yes, a kappa. Your daughter… I am so sorry.”

Joshua crawled across the grass to Amanda’s head, carrying it back to their group. He was already emptied of tears. Takashi knew he would be haunted by the events of the day for the rest of his life.

“I will fix this. The kappa will hurt you no more.” 

The kappa was groaning, begging to be helped, and Takashi stood up, cupping his hands with water from the lake. Angie and her husband were too preoccupied to notice, and he pushed the Kappa upright, emptying the water into its dish. The kappa sprang back to life.

_“In return... for helping me… I will be eternally your servant…”_

“Leave this place and never return. Never harm a soul again.”

_“...Wakarimashita. I understand.”_

The kappa walked into the lake, sinking slowly into the depths. Police sirens echoed through the empty park and Takashi sank to his knees, watching blood and tufts of blonde hair mix with the red cherry blossoms of April’s happy hanami.


	2. [Lost] In The Pines

**[Lost] In the Pines**

**Dylan Crites**

Long as memory, the snow spent its day lounging on Old Grrim, the Gray Mountain’s great leader. Morning rays met it and begun its melt. The result of was a silken water, a liquid ice that carved a nook into the Old Gray’s neighbor, Shatter Tooth. The water never relented pushing, pulling, dragging everything from Shatter Tooth. Until all the anyone saw was the great gray tooth, Old Grrim, and an empty socket, a valley. Old Grrim forever in mourning looms over his former brother’s grave. 

Nobody was there to see when the Hammersaw appeared in that dead mountain’s grave. Stores, cabins, stables, a smithy, and a town hall. All connected by in a web of roads with the smithy in the center. The two main roads in the town went around the building, as if the heat and clanging drove them away.

The summer had cool, linen nights; with a tapestry woven with cream and stars coming in the night to give a respite from the hot sun and the hungry, blue sky. It’s then when the sticky, sweet sap smell that suffused the town was ignored by the people who had whiled away generations in their green prison. Winter wasn’t so pleasant. In winter the Warden grew angry with its prisoners who knew not their crimes. The Pines, the hateful ones, would breathe foul, arctic winds, clawing at any scraps of warmth.

In her family home, northwest from the town’s hearth, Zelda felt that soon the Pines would begin to breathe, and that it was the best time to act. In her well loved leather and canvas bag went a well-loved hatchet, the cast iron pan that hung on the mantelpiece of her childhood home, and however many vegetables she could fit in the worn down by many hand’s touch. 

Leaving the house wasn’t the hardest part. The hardest part was crossing the hundred-foot moat of ochre grass standing firm against the Pines. Zelda knew that this was the only place she could turn back and only loose the satisfaction of solved mystery. 

The only thing Zelda was sure about was that Dot walked directly from her house in the Northwest section of Hammersaw into the forest. Zelda had heard more about the absent girl, but she didn’t think it was true.

* * *

Leather boots, fresh-oiled and creased, shorts, oliver and canvas, a button up, loose and open. That’s what Birch saw walk into the Pines from the window of his, or rather his dad’s, house. His left eye twitched. On went the wool jacket. Next the shoes. Hand at the door handle.

“Birch! Stop!”

The knob pulled open and Birch entered the portal, but he felt a hand gripping at the scruff of his jacket. 

“Please don’t, not again”

Birch’s jaw pushed forward as he exhaled. His father’s hand wasn’t pulling him back into the house, but it would stop him if he tried to go further. 

“Trust me when I say that Zelda is already dead. You know what happened to Dot and I don’t wanna see you go, too.”

Arms crossed, lips pursed, Birch stared at Tom.

“uh, if-if ya…want I could tell you what really happened.” Said Tom as he let go of his son’s jacket.

Birch noded.

Tom started. “She was an outsider. No one talked to her-“

Birch walked out the open door. First, he felt the rounded points of the cobblestones, before it gave way to dry, stalks of grass. Each offering a resistive pull against his boot before crumbling and crunching under his weight. If Tom was calling after him, he didn’t notice or care. He wanted to find Zelda.

Birch knew if he could get past the fence three hundred feet from the edge of the Pines he would be safe. If.

Luck was not on his side. Morgan Stern, the blacksmith, must have been fixing some bent nails or something behind the fence because before Birch knew it, he was there. A Cheshire grin surrounded by perfectly smooth skin was the only thing Birch could see from under the shadow of a flat-brimmed black gambler’s hat. 

“C’mon now boy, listen to your dear ol’ dad. We-I wouldn’t want to find two bodies in that there forest.” Stern said, tongue flicking and weaving in and out his maw.

Birch kept walking toward the spot he saw his friends head bounce into. 

Just as he passed Stern, the blacksmith said “Stop.”

Birch stopped.

“I told you once and I will not say it again.”

For a second, Birch was silent. Then, in a burst of rebellion, he pivoted his body, fist ready to knock the blacksmith’s head from under his hat. The fist never connected. Where was he? There was an instant of confusion before Birch felt impacts all over his body. Boots, fists, elbows, knees. The boy fell. He had no idea what just happened. Dazed and looking skyward, he saw that the blacksmith was holding a lighter to his own face. The flame went out, and a red eye was left to keep Birch in line. From this angle, the hat blocked the sun. The sky was gone, and all Birch could see was an expanding black circle. In its center, a new sun. 

Stern said “My, you sure took quite the fall there didn’t’cha ya boy?”, his voice echoing against the grass and the fence and the town.

* * *

Dot skated the edge of her knife along the metal rod. No spark. 

Again. She was sure that was something.

Again. There, a spark. It climbed its way onto the small pile of kindling, eager to escape the wind that tore at Dot. Strands of grass and fibers of wood saw a flash of orange across them, leaving a behind a fine char. Flames started to grow, and in thanks they kissed Dot’s hand, burning her tender skin.

She recoiled.

Stygian wind grabbed the flame by its neck and choked it into submission. Smoke drifted up from what was left of the kindling. Dot put her hand against the horizon, she counted the fingers that separated the black ground and the blazing, cherry eye. One. Fifteen to seventeen minutes to darkness. For the thirty second time she aligned the knife and the rod and pushed. 

It would take six more tries and twelve minutes before she got the fire going. Like her, the fire was a weary thing, brought into this world by a loving mother who was clueless in rearing children. But this fire was not quitter. It twirled, whirled and sputtered in the face of the wind. And it kept its mother safe from the wind’s ripping nails.

A great dark mass. The town to the south. In the middle of that mass, a cigarette burns. 

For the first time, Dot was able to see her surroundings with some clarity. The brave little fire had its limitations. Shadows had their backs pushed into every crack and creige. They were stretched to their absolute limit hiding from the light. Little abysses were broken up by stony ridges, knots-in-the-wood, the peaks of folded, twisted, and crinkled fabric. Dot wanted desperately to run her fingers into the shadows on the pine whose knotted and gnarled roots she rested in, but they were less shadows than eyes. And for the first time in her life, Dot didn’t want to know why that was.

As the fire kept spurting and coughing and hacking into the night, the shadows realized they had nothing to fear. This child, this false demon, was nothing compared to the great burning cherry in the sky. It would not punish them. It did not even know of them. 

They stretched their paws and claws from their hiding place. They ached. Some latched their claws into Dot’s cloak and began and ebb and flow. Testing, prodding. These by-the-night bakers began the preparation of the girl. Working her flesh into something smooth and supple. Every push broke her down, letting the paws push even further. One sunk in it’s claws to get a better gripe.

Dot’s wood-grain iris flashed in the dark. She leaped towards the fire, nearly jumping in before pushing herself out of it’s intense grasp. Static festered along her back. Turing to look at what was happening, she found a green wool cloak and on it uneven holes ringed with a pulsating black, reminding her of the first time she fed paper to the fire. These holes were eating the cloak. They were spreading. 

Right hand grasped against the cold steel clasp at her neck as she doubled over and tried to slip the hungry thing off her. It resisted; the felted fabric pulled closer around her neck. Out of her boot flashed a knife. Cutting and biting the cloak. Ripping pieces off to save the choking girl. Finally, the possessed thing was sliced off. The ichor coated remains were pushed into the fire with a branch. All that was left of the cloak was a hood, and just enough to keep any rain off Dot’s shoulders.

* * *

By the way the air shimmered, Zelda felt that she had the lesser part of an hour to find someplace to settle for the night. She didn’t like that. From Hammersaw, the edge of the Pines was chaotic: vines, bushes, eyes, tails, thorns, flowers. As she slowly exited the former foothills of Shatter tooth the Pines took their natural form. Here there was nothing but neat rows and columns of nearly identical Pines. If she looked directly to any the cardinal directions she could see through miles and miles of the trees. To the west, a tunnel of Pine framed the sky, burning around a central mass of burning tobacco. Swirling, twisting, so bright. To the east. Heavy, looming hemlock and the cry of peacocks. Deep, heavy, where light dies.

Zelda trudged on. Snap. Her foot sent a log smiling into the darkness. Around her were footprints, bigger than hers, female. There was a pile of faded cloth. One of its edges had been haphazardly shredded with a sharp blade. Zelda grabbed a handful of the fabric and moved it to the side. Underneath lied a crow’s nest bundle of sticks, dry and cloyingly dusty. 

“I’m sorry you were left like this” Zelda said to the former cloak and the raggedy pile of twigs. The Shadows watched. She lifted two of the corners off the cloak and lifted the thing into the air. A child’s handful of Pine needles clung in the valleys of the cloak’s folds. Zelda picked each one off with her fingers and let them drift along the motes of dust and final rays of a dying day. The sticks were taken away and buried in a blanket of their pine needle comrades. Briefly looking up to stretch her neck Zelda saw a mass of blonde hair reflect the sky’s red light. Two eyes and a pin-prick red sun crouched over it.

* * *

Morgan Stern’s house stood three and a half stories tall. A wooden castle surrounded by a perfectly clean dirt road. Not so much as a footprint disturbed the even, loose dust. The outside of the palace was made of painted person-sized wooden squares: ochre, mint, dusty blood. Each of these panels was embellished with a snappy, white trim, and occasionally with two diagonal beams. Forming a white X. Three towers jutted out of the side of the house at odd angles in defiance of logic. Day and night, you could hear the tinka tinka tunka of a hammer hard at work. The house was filled with numerous oddities, shrunken heads, tarot cards, tridents, gnome statues, festive statues of a fat man in a red and white suit, fiddles, harps, stuffed animal heads, and the golden statues of people who were.

Birch’s neck stretched so that his chin touched his chest. He tried to roll his head to the side, hoping to get it facing the ceiling. He was sapped of any energy, as if he had spent the past two days busting boulders without rest. He tried to move his arms, then his legs. Nothing. There was a warmth surrounding all his limbs, it almost burned. Taking a deep breath, he smelled furniture polish, old books, dust, and perfectly cooked pork. 

“C’mon boy, git up.” Said Stern.

Birch’s head nodded up with great effort. He was in front of a desk. Behind the desk sat a shelf filled with books and gilded oddities and Morgan Stern. He tried to find the eyes under Stern’s shadowy brow, but his eyes couldn’t escape the brave little sun, burning at the end of Stern’s cigarette, keeping him in check. The Blacksmith’s hat was gone, underneath stringy, hematite hair, long enough for a stray lock of hair to reach his bearded jaw.

“What do you want.”

“I’m not evil, least, I don’t reckon I am.”

“You just let a girl walk into the Pines. I could’ve got her. She’s probably dead now. I hope you’re happy.”

“Nobody who goes into the Pines comes out.”

“Why?”

“That’s jus how infinity works, boy.”

Birch didn’t like that answer.

Morgan walked to the window. He watched the droplets of rain chase after each other, endlessly speeding down the crystalline pane. “At one point this was paradise. The technology was advanced enough that our lives were easy, but not so advanced we lost that fundamental human connection. We lived in a darln’ little town, in the middle of a pine forest that can never be over harvested. All the books and roaring fire a bibliophile and nature lover could ever want. But when you have forever, you run out of things to do. And then all you have left to do is wait. Forever.”

“And what, exactly, does that have to do with Zelda going into the forest?” The boy asked.

“She must have been bored.”

“Bored of what?” Birch demanded “We’ve only been alive for…for…” he blinked.

The wrinkles around Morgan’s eyes grew deeper as his mouth spread across his face. “You’re jus’ as old as everyone else here. Human mind can only store so much information ‘fore it starts forgettn’’.”

“Then what are you?”

“I think I may have been an angel. A demon. Pro’ly both. But ‘nuf time and you jus’ begin to sorta…exist. I guess. No better way to describe it.”

Birch tried to jump out of the chair. All he could do was get a creak out of the wooden floor under the ornate Persian rug.

“The girls are going to meet soon. Dot and Zelda. I know it’s hard to understand, but they choose to leave. So, I won’t let them come back, or maybe they will never find their way back. Ya know, everything you could ever want is in that forest. Immortality, answers, a way to die. But the town is safe. No one leaves, no one dies, no one is happy. It is safe. If I believed in will I’d let you run after them.”

“Don’t you mean free will?” asked the boy.

“No, that exists. I got it. Or, maybe I had it.” Morgan reminisced. “Either way you sure as shit don’t.”

“Why am I here then, I’ll just forget, let me go.”

“You will. Forget that is. But not ‘fore you go hootn’ and hollern’ about the devil in the middle of town. I caint kill any of y’all, ya know. I don’t want to spend even a fraction of infinity waiting for y’all to forget. I may not be able to kill you, but I can do the next best thing.”

Birch tensed every muscle in his body trying to break free. It was futile. He couldn’t move, he couldn’t even feel anything below his neck. Morgan walked around the desk. For once Birch saw his eyes. Gold. Morgan lifted a hand and placed its palm over Birch’s eyes.

“It’s okay boy, it’s all okay.”

The boy looked at the black smith from between the man’s course fingers. As if to say “Go to Hell.”

“I’m already there, dontcha worry your head about me.”

The boy’s head, like the rest of his body was covered with gold. Birch wasn’t dead. He wasn’t even comatose. Eventually he would stop thinking. At least, that’s what Morgan hoped.


	3. Paradise

**Paradise**

**Nicole Poissant**

Slick black shoes clicking rhythmically on the bleached tiles, Hugh made his way to his next patient’s room, clipboard in hand. The stench of death was thick in the air, covered pointlessly by the sickly citrus scent of disinfectant. It was quiet, save for the occasional moans of pain from each ajar hospital room. Hugh knew most of the people on this floor, as it was his designated area, but recently, the hospital had been receiving an overflow of sick patients. The hospital was really one of the few places that was protected from the outside world. Few windows lined the walls, the ones inside each room covered by musky curtains or blinds. It was easier to avoid the eradication by staying indoors, after all.

Rounding another corner, Hugh squinted at the unusual amount of natural light in the hallway. At the very end of the hall, a large window was open. He rubbed at the scruff that clung to his rough complexion, gritting his teeth at the stinging in his eyes. The buzzing yellow overhead lights were all he knew at this point, and he barked out in anger at any doctor or nurse who might happen to be in this part of the building.

“Who left the blinds up?! Don’t subject the dying to this.” He clicked across the hall towards the offending visual, snatching the drawstring of the flimsy blinds. Before he could pull it shut, he stopped for a moment, feeling his throat close up. Thick smog covered the barren parking lot, swirling down to the ground like acid rain, eating away at anything past 20 feet from the hospital. If he kept his hand pressed against the glass for long enough, he was sure his fingertips would melt together. He peeked around the wall, and immediately, he felt like vomiting at the sight of bodies piled up, wrapped in individual bags of plastic like packaged meat at a store. Flies, wasps, and spiders skittered in and out of the spaces in the bodies, and even from the sixth floor, he could see their melting faces, sticking to the sides of their slippery clear wrappings, soupy skin and bubbling blood wrinkling whatever was left of them.

Each one of them died from the infection. It wasn’t a named virus because it was the only infection that mattered. If you got the infection, you were guaranteed to die. The infection eats at the body from the inside out, heating your blood to a boil until your organs popped like water balloons. Hugh briefly considered running at full speed towards the door, breaking the glass, and falling to his death to let himself splat, but before he could think about doing anything else, he snapped the string down, shutting the blinds with a feral vigor.

It was easier to forget. It would be easier this way. Stay inside.

“Hugh. Patient is waiting.” Ramona called out to him quietly, red heels tapping towards his hunched position at the windowsill. He gripped at his hair, tugging the oily black strands in frustration. If it wasn’t for the current state of the world, he would have asked her out by now. She was gentle, kind, even in the face of death that surrounded them. How could he do anything when he was sure to die in the next few years?

“Yeah. On it.” He didn’t look at her, moping down the hall, hands shoved in the pockets of his white coat while he tucked his clipboard under his arm. He didn’t like the way his heart jumped at the sight of her soft expression. It was pointless. He looked up at the numbers situated above every door, scanning them in a daze until his eyes stopped on the number 7. A lucky number. Hilarious. Pushing himself into the room, he eyed the body lying in the bed. It was a teenager, surprisingly. Hugh’s eyebrows lifted in mild surprise, and his mouth turned up just a hair.

“We don’t get many of you around here.”

“I’ll bet. There’s not many of us left.” The boy laughed, regretting it as a vicious cough ripped from his throat. Blood splattered into his open palm, and he smiled, flinging the red off his hand with a flick of his wrist. Hugh grimaced, kicking the metal leg of the bed with a clang as a warning.

“Keep infection to yourself. I’m not looking to die today.”

“Sorry, man. Vincent, by the way, but I’m sure you already knew that.” Hugh sat on a nearby stool, rolling himself towards the edge of the bed. Before he could make any assessments, Vincent spoke. “You don’t have to bother. I’m gonna die anyways.”

“Why? Don’t you want to at least go out in less pain?”

“I will.” Hugh leaned forward curiously, noticing a glint of joy flash across Vincent’s face.

“You do realize that ain’t gonna happen without medication, right son?” A strange sound filled the room, and it took Hugh a few moments to realize that it was laughter. He hadn’t heard that in months. It sounded foreign, taunting. Why was this kid, laying on his _literal death bed_ , laughing?

“Boy, doctor, do I have something for you. You don’t leave this place much, huh?”

“No. I live here. Why?”

“Check this out.” Vincent reached into the pocket of his thin shorts, pulling out a small plastic bag. Pills.

“Really? That’s what you’re so excited about? Don’t tempt me.” Sarcasm dripped from Hugh’s lips. Just another drug addict. Before Hugh could wheel away and continue his work, Vincent grabbed his sleeve, pulling him further against the bed.

“You’ve seen this stuff, huh?”

“Yeah. Only twice. Found ‘em on two other patients. That color really stands out.” The capsule of the pill was a vibrant citron, almost annoyingly so. Acidic. Toxic. Vincent unzipped the bag, a single pill rolling into his open hand. He held it out to Hugh.

“Say hello to Paradise.”

“What in the… Paradise? That’s what you call it? _Please._ ” Hugh rolled his eyes, pushing the tanned hand away. Vincent thrusted it back towards the man, eyes filled with delight.

“Come on. At least take it with you. What have you got left to lose?”

“Don’t bother. Holler if you’re dying or something, not that you seem to care.” Hugh stood, pushing the stool back towards the metal desk with the back of his foot. He walked out of the door without another word, but he didn’t miss the way Vincent’s laugh followed him out. Damned kids. He thought he missed them, but this one just ruined that. Hugh wasn’t watching in front of him, stumbling when he bumped into another body. Ramona. His breath hitched, eyes following the shine in her red curls as she turned to face him. She smiled sweetly, pushing her red glasses further up her freckled nose.

“Hugh. How was he?”

“...Huh?”

“Vincent. The boy.”

“R-Right. He’s a lost cause.” Hugh scoffed at the thought of the kid, crossing his arms in frustration. Ramona frowned, smacking Hugh’s arm lightly.

“Hey, don’t be like that!”

“Don’t blame me, woman! You should’ve been there. Kid is a brat. Refused treatment.”

“That’s no reason to insult him. We’re all trying our best, aren’t we? He is no exception, even if you have a problem with him.” Hugh felt a small pit of guilt in his gut for making her upset. He didn’t want to be the cause of her discomfort. He remained silent, running a hand through his black locks with an audible sigh.

“Sorry.”

“It’s fine. Just be a little more kind, alright? You’re needed in room 40.” Hugh nodded, walking around her to get to the stairs. A long day of the same mundane routine followed him, marking patients as deceased, hearing echoing cries of pain and popping from those with ruptured organs, admitting hopeless young adults, watching Ramona from afar. Pointless. Idiotic. Frustrated.

Tired.

Hugh stepped into the lounge, seeing the sleeping bodies of his fellow doctors sprawled onto the cold tile. They looked drained, zombified, covered in sweat with sore muscles from constantly running around. Hugh was hit with the stench of humid dirt and mud, and he wondered when they last showered, let alone changed their clothes out. Each one was nothing but piled pieces of cargo on a rocking ship, seasick with malnourishment and dehydration. The ones that worked the graveyard shift lived here, but ever since more patients had been admitted than capacity, they could no longer sleep empty rooms. Hugh hadn’t sat in a bed in forever. He was almost jealous of the dead. They had a comfortable place to die. He felt sleep tugging at his eyes, beckoning him to close them, but one sight at a sleeping Ramona curled up on an armchair had him out of the room in seconds. He went out into the hallway, sliding down the wall to press his face into his knees.

Ramona was the only thing keeping him grounded at this point. Her voice was sugary sweet, her tone was smooth like honey. Hugh was convinced that she was some kind of angel, sent to earth to drive him absolutely insane. She never raised her voice, she was never negative despite the situation they lived in, she tolerated his shit. Seeing something like her surviving gave him hope that maybe he had a chance at living a normal life, though the rational part of his brain shut that down quickly.

Thoughts swirling to a dull hum, Hugh fell asleep in the hallway of the doomed hospital, comforted knowing Ramona was within reach, alive, and breathing.

* * *

“Hugh, wake up…”

“...Huh?”

His face felt cold, and he realized he had fallen over from his original sitting position, now plastered across the floor.

“You have to get to work. We let you sleep a little longer than usual.”

“Thanks, I guess.”

The doctor, who he should have been familiar with at this point in his career, walked down the hallway to leave him be. He slowly rose from the floor, back cracking in several places, before continuing his daily chores.

He wasn’t prepared for the events to follow.

It was around lunchtime, and he had already announced several young adults as dead. He was watching one of these people get hauled away to be dumped outside, already wrapped in plastic like the ones outside, naked, boiling skin bubbling off into streams of heavy steam and gummy muscle tissue, when he spotted something more concerning further away.

Ramona, leaning against a wall, surrounded by doctors.

He hauled across the floor, nearly tripping over his own feet, now hearing their panicked voices bouncing off the walls.

_“Ramona, Ramona, are you alright?”_

_“Ramona, can you stand?”_

_“I’m fine, I’m fine!”_

_“You’re bleeding.”_

Hugh narrowed his eyes at the doctors, telling them to back off. If she said she was fine, then she was fine!

But she wasn’t. She never was.

Ramona dropped like a rock to the floor, and the unfamiliar, brutish doctors picked her up, running with her delicate body into the room that had just been emptied. Hugh’s hands shook, watching the bright redhead get hooked up to several monitors and machines, completely out of place for her beauty. She continued to insist that she was fine, that she just needed to sit down for a minute, but they examined her, touched her, shoved tubes and needles into her arms and her lungs, violating her body, and Hugh never left, immobilized. The skin at her elbows was already beginning to ooze off, bloody steam rising out of her open mouth. Her eyes were blown wide in terror, pain eating up at every vein in her body. Hugh didn’t want to admit it. He couldn’t admit it. How could he live? What could he possibly do?

She was infected. She was going to die.

* * *

Hugh let out a vicious scream, punching his fist into the thin drywall of the hallway. He heard a resounding laughter coming from the room he just disturbed, and he stomped to the door, slamming it open.

**_“And what’s so fucking funny?”_**

“You! You’re freaking out over nothing! It’s nothing because you can make it nothing! You already know what the answer is!” It was Vincent, the teenager he had abandoned to die in room 7. Hugh searched his face, and it finally hit him.

“You’re telling me that the only thing that matters to me on this godforsaken planet can be saved by some stupid pills from a druggie?!”

“I’m not just a drug addict. I have taste. I can guarantee you that a couple of these will save you and your woman.”

“How did you even know it was her?!”

“They told me so.”

Hugh stood up straight, blinking furiously. What the hell was this kid talking about?  


“Stop being so cryptic! Tell me who! Was it the doctors?! I told them to leave you to die!”

“It wasn’t the doctors. It was them, in Paradise.” Vincent held out a single toxic citron pill, looking at Hugh seriously.

“I don’t follow.”

“This isn’t just some hallucinogenic, Doctor. This is so much more than that. If you think we are the only things in the universe, the only higher beings on our own planet, then you’re a bigger fool than I thought. We don’t take Paradise to feel good, we take Paradise to talk to them, the other beings on this planet. We can’t see them, they are beyond our comprehension. Our brain just chooses to ignore their presence. Paradise allows us to gain that knowledge, enough to see them, hear them, feel their emotions...”

“Now, you say this _isn’t_ a hallucinogenic, but that sounds _exactly_ like a hallucinogenic. You’re insane.”

“Don’t you want to help your woman? What other choice do you have?” He lifted the little pill higher into the air, and Hugh swore it seemed to be alive, shaking in his hand, waiting to be set free into his body. His eardrums thumped inside his head, his heart hammered. It felt wrong, but Hugh knew that the kid was _right_. Nobody had the answers anymore, nobody went outside. It’s not like he could call for a doctor at a hospital to fix her up because HE was a doctor at a hospital, and so was she. He was never one to take drugs, but in a fit of frustration, he snatched the pill from Vincent’s hand and tossed it into his mouth, swallowing it dry.

Vincent smirked.

Hugh felt the walls shake, vibrating with a low, melodious, pleased hum. Everything began to grow fuzzy, like the infinity of static on a television screen, only it was more colorful, uncontrolled, like the rainbow effect of the sun on an oil spill. The room felt thick and heavy, and only then did Hugh register the looming presence in the room, eyes fixed on him at all angles, everywhere. Something he couldn’t understand, something his brain didn’t _want_ to understand, was in the room, with them, always. It was taller than anything he could imagine, yet it still managed to squeeze itself into the small room, backed up against the wall, head snapping against the ceiling. It was humming. It was _pleased._

**_They were all pleased._**

“W-What the hell is going on?! W-Who are you?! What is this place?! Where did everything go?!”

Garbled gibberish answered him. It was rough and throaty, the sound of a heavy smoker attempting to sing. The tones then separated, a dual high-pitched note following the low tone, like two people singing at once. Two voices, or what he thought were voices, were being forced out of their bodies, a hissing bottle of helium that hadn’t been twisted shut all the way.

Hugh tried to scream. He could only hear the continuous moan of pleasure of the beings in Paradise. They talked to him, told him things, and he writhed on the floor, tears staining his strained cheeks. He was learning things he didn’t want to know, things he was too stupid to realize. His brain felt like it was about to explode from the knowledge of these beings, and they never stopped, relentless, humming, singing, purring.

Then it was over.

Hugh shot up from the floor, covered in a sheen of sweat. Vincent had been waiting patiently. Turning to the doctor who was frothing at the mouth.

“You may be scared at first, but they just want to help.”

“H-How could you do that to me?! W-What the hell…. What the hell?!” Hugh ran out of the room, fumbling down the hall to lock himself in the men’s restroom, screaming into his hands. He wiped away his continuous tears, and he felt violated, like he had seen things he shouldn’t see.

He thought to himself once his break of hysteria had passed over, and he realized he knew way more than he did originally. He could recite the entire english dictionary in his head. He knew math that he didn’t know existed. He knew a foreign language, a mess of controlled hums that rise and fell simultaneously to convey meaning.

He knew how to help Ramona.

* * *

Hugh had been up all night mixing things together, finishing up his first and only bottle of medicine. It wasn’t for anyone else. It was for Ramona. Everything was for her.

The hospital had a small pharmacy on the first floor, and here he was, crushing pills down, pouring out bottles of liquids, hunched over, mixing them together. It would work. He knew it would work. He didn’t have to use another patient as a test subject.

When he was done, he held up an orange pill bottle filled with a bright blue powder. He stuffed it in the pocket of his coat, making his way to Ramona’s room. She was asleep when he entered, looking paler than normal. Other than that, she was fine. She was going to be fine. She had a glass of water next to her bed, within her reach, and Hugh dumped the powder into her water, watching it dissolve, walking out.

She was better within three days.

Nobody knew how. She was doomed to die, just like the rest of them, but she survived despite the odds. They had deemed it a miracle. Vincent knew otherwise. It was them, it was all their doing. The Paradise. They told him how.

“Doctor, what are you doing back here? I thought you saved your woman.”

“Have they told you how to survive?”

“I asked them not to. I’m ready to go.”

“You’re okay with dying?”

“Perfectly so.”

Hugh scratched the back of his neck.

“Hey… Thanks, kid. What you did for me… It means a lot.”

“Yes, yes.”

“... Do you think I could have another? I want to thank them.”

“Yes, yes.”

Vincent handed Hugh another pill, and he swallowed it dry, standing still. The familiar feeling of the walls vibrating returned, and his head was filled with static and hums. He was only planning on saying thank you, but he watched the being in the room closely. He could make out their shape now, unlike before. They seemed to make more sense to him, like his brain was accepting their presence. Hugh waved, and it waved back, long, fingerless tentacle-like mass swaying back and forth.

He knew what they were saying now.

**_Your woman is alive_**

**_Alive_ **

**_Alive_ **

****

**_She’s alive Alive_ **

****

**_Thanks to us_ **

****

“She’s alive because of you. Thank you.”

**_Our tongue_**

**_Our tongue Our tongue_ **

****

**_You speak it_ **

****

“You taught it to me, didn’t you?”

**_We did_**

**_we did_ **

**_We_ **

**_We would like to teach you_ **

**_More_ **

**_Hugh Human Doctor_ **

****

“Teach me? What are you going to teach me?”

**_Everything_ **

* * *

Hugh had been taking Paradise continuously for nearly five days now. Ramona was up and walking again, but she never once was able to stop and talk to Hugh. Doctors asked about him, wondering why he was so skittish, so gaunt, so irritable, but he never stopped to chat with any of them. All they knew was that he frequented room 7 a little too much.

Ramona rounded the corner, only to bump into the very man she was worried about.

“Hugh, are you alright?”

“...” 

“We haven’t seen you in forever. You don’t look like yourself.”

“Save you all…”

“...Excuse me?” She quirked her head to the side at the strange word choice. Hugh then coughed violently, Ramona screeching as blood splattered against her coat. “What’s gotten into you! You must be infected! Is that what this is?! Why didn’t you say something!”

Hugh responded with a resounding series of high and low hums, like his voice was separating, singing in two tones at once. Ramona backed against the wall, terrified, and Hugh took off running down the hall, bursting into room 7. Vincent backed against the headboard, looking confused.

  
“If you’re here for Paradise, you can forget it. You’re addicted. That was never my intention.”

Hugh grabbed a letter opener, stabbing into Vincent’s chest, puncturing his beating heart. He watched the light drain from his eyes, and once he was gone, Hugh ripped the pockets of the boy’s shorts, finally finding his bag of drugs.

Ramona was still standing in the hallway, and she collapsed when she saw Hugh stained with fresh, bright red blood, like the cherry colored heels on her feet. He stormed past her, slamming himself shut into the men’s bathroom. He sat on the toilet, coughing, blood splattering against the walls.

Paradise is a lie.

After saving Ramona, Hugh was determined to figure out how to save the planet. It was a big task for one man, but he knew that with the help of _them_ , he could do it. However, that was never their goal. They didn’t want to help him. They wanted to tell him everything they knew, their vast, infinite knowledge.

With each new body that died and each new admitted patient, when they were asleep or dead, Hugh had been taking their stash of Paradise. Now that he was alone, he wheezed with laughter, downing an entire bag of pills. The room stirred, the walls turned to mushy wet paper.

**Paradise smiled.**

Screams tore at his throat, snapping his vocal chords in half. Despite this immense pain, he continued to scream, the haunting echo of the last of his voice ringing through the halls like the high-pitched squealing of a dying pig. He scratched at his face, skin caking under his sharp nails that hadn’t been cut in months. Dragging his nails repeatedly over his face, he slowly took his skin off, peeling it away like thin segments of string cheese, the bloody tissue falling across the floor, strips of confetti at a child’s birthday party. He wanted to get out of his body. He wanted to get out of his damp skin, his wet bones, his dry lungs. His eyeball rolled across the floor, useless to the door. Banging, the doctors tried to break the lock, and Hugh worked faster, scratching, screaming, spewing blood and his own guts across the floor.

Humans were only meant to know so much. The realities of the universe, the infinity of the beings of Paradise, it was a sensory overload.

Paradise was turning him into one of them.

When the door finally busted open, Ramona dropped to her knees, a guttural scream ripping across the hall. She held Hugh’s eyeball in her hands, the only visible piece of him left in this dirty, gutted world. Hugh was painting the walls.


	4. Boys and Girls in the Dark

**Boys and Girls in the Dark**

**Dylan Crites**

Two boys huddled in the dark, blue light from a phone licked their faces. “The first thing you should do is consult the demonology book of your choosing, the best two are the _Pseudomonarchia Daemonum_ and the _Ars Goetia_. Make sure you don’t… pick something too…fun _”_ said the phone in a poor attempt at the macabre. The video was playing from the browser of the phone, it was found on a website called TRU-American-scares.net. It’s background was filled with clip art of people being hung, dark gothic houses, and crows.

The tallest boy, Gregor, grabbed the phone, it’s light skittered across the walls and ceiling, giving flashes of grimly corporate basement. Before resting on a greasy, dusty floor. Greg sent a spray of spittle into their faces when told them to keep the volume down. The two watching the video payed him no mind.

The rest of the boys all pretended to listen to the video while looking at the ground. They were really staring at the mostly naked woman who laid in the middle of the room. They hadn’t abducted her like that, but John the leader decided that “the fabric will interfere with the ritual.” The video made no mention of that, but the other boys didn’t dare argue. They were eager to do the deed. Stripping, groping and gawking and the first woman any of them had seen less than fully dressed in real life.

She had spent her entire life in the city, excluding her four years at the [](https://imgur.com/qAvyuWG). An excessively average time: She studied, partied, made friends, and learned about all the cruelty the world has to offer. All very typical of a student. Perhaps the most important lesson she learned was that her chosen profession was already saturated with people she thought were better and more talented than her. She moved home to save some money and bide her time as a waitress in a high-class restaurant. Like many humans, she enjoyed music, movies, and art. By no means was she dull, she enjoyed the things others did for the same reason they did. She had no need to shout from the rooftops how different and unique she was. She was comfortable in her mediocrity.

* * *

[ ](https://imgur.com/sqj8z3y)

Glassy eyed John scrolled through a feed trough of videos. Before his eyes shut for the night, he felt a pair of eyes stare into his own black irises. He turned the phone around, scanning the room with the meager light it provided. Behind the dim furniture, shadows crouched, waiting for their enemy to disappear. There was nothing. Turning his phone back to his face, Sateen found what was looking at him. Just on the horizon of his screen he saw two white pinhole eyes coming from darkness. He scrolled a little further and found a title “3 Creepy Rituals you Should Never Do”.

When morning came, he finally stopped watching the video. He had lost count how many times he’d seen it. Like many boys his age, he showed the video to anyone who cared to watch. The boys were all under it’s thrall. They set out to try one of the rituals. However, the group could not decide on one.

“The shadow one is the best” said Willy, the squat, rectangular red head “we’ll be able to hide, and scare people, and see gir-“

“I’m not some creep,” said Roy, the contrarian, “the first ritual is way cooler, and we aren’t stuck only being able to sneak around like some goddamned pervs. Plus, the Eucaleon one…”

“It is called the Euclidean ritual.” Said Gregor.

Roy got in his face. “Who gives a fuck?!”

“I do,” said Greg.

Willy tried to chime in. “Uh, if you guys can’t agr-“

“Well no one asked you, you string bean piece of shit. The Eucaldeon one,” Roy said to Gregor “is way cooler. Do you know how jealous everyone would be if we were that powerful? I for one am sick of the rest of you never listening to me.”

Gregor was seething. He was the smartest of the boys and he was being told off by some runt. Gregor was not one to be trifled with. He grabbed Roy by the small boy’s collar, enough so his shoes could barely scrape the sticky remnants left of the floor by the past. Roy tried to scratch and bite his way free. He successfully tasted blood when he bit down on Gregor’s forearm. In response Gregor whipped Roy’s head to the ground.

“Who cares what might happen, the shadow one is cooler, and we probably won’t die,” Said Merrick, the boy whose baby fat seemed to grow with him, “I don’t want to go plunging into some abyss when there are plenty of things on earth to enjoy….Right?”

“We are doing the Call To ritual, it’s the only ritual that works,” said John with a glare.

“Yeah, we’ve decided,” said Ratface, the Sycophant, hiding behind John as a protection from the other boys. 

“But that one is scary, if we mess it up the video says we will die.” Started Merrick, “I don’t want to die, my mom is making lamb tonight.”

“No! Don’t listen to him. I mean-do…uh…listen to him, the Shadow ritual is way cooler. But definitely not because we might die from the other one.” Said Willy.

“I said we are doing the Call To.”

[ ](https://imgur.com/0mmxmbK)

Much like how the boys lacked taste, they lacked medical knowledge. The boys would often watch slapstick and exploitation films, becoming so inundated with the genres that it became their reality. When the Woman rounded the corner, Gregor began a to violently flail his boney limbs at her, trying to knock her unconscious. But humans are more resilient than movies given them credit for; it took three minutes for him to knock her out. Three minutes of him looking like a skeleton trying to free itself.

She would jerk in and out of consciousness for whatever short time she had left. Her mind was fully functional, in the sense that her thoughts were unimpeded, but her memory grew progressively worse and she had little to no control over her body. She will suffer.

* * *

In 1957, the Williams building was inhabited by the Olympus Science Company. Founded five years prior by Austin J. Thompson, whose name would eventually emblazon the building, a genius in his chosen field. He left his former employer when the patents he had worked on in his free time were finalized. After that, he moved into the basement of the Williams building. Things were good, the money was coming at a steady pace, he was able to hire more staff, rent more floors of the building, but he always kept the basement to himself. Eventually, Dot Vandermire, was brought in as a secretary. She was the sweet sentimental type. The sort of girl who remember the happenings of your own family better than you.

Like some Hollywood cliché Austin was eccentric, he had been his whole life. One of his tamer habits having extended conversations with himself. He loved these chats. Late at night, his staff would hear him cheerfully run problems by himself:

Asking

Then Explaining

How long this lasted depended on the problem’s difficulty. The longest conversation he ever had was 20-two hours, thirty-nine minutes and 12 seconds. The question was simple “Should I ask Dot to marry me?” He figured it out though. He always does.

Dot would often stay late with him; she enjoyed the umbral silence in the building because it inspired her still-life impressionisms. She painted things from her childhood: road trips with her dad, diners, amusement parks, hotels from a golden age passed, and deserts. Her pieces could be found in the homes of her friends and coworkers, often requested specifically as birthday or Christmas gifts, and she was happy to oblige. Her latest work was on called the “Good Time Dinner” located at the edge of a desert city deep in the southwest. She hummed gently, creating a simple musical piece with the accompanying night percussion that drifted in through the window. The clock read 10:42.

She glances over and the humming stops. “Eleven already?!” She puts up the art supplies and grabs her coat and purse. The walk down to the basement was beautiful on that day, a spotlight of moonlight illuminated forced the shadows to hid from the girl. Its harsh light left the room soft. The percale air could be felt even inside. Her heels adding metronome to the tune she had restarted. Distantly, Austin’s voice was providing the unintentional vocals, too faint to be understood. She drummed closer.

“-aintly something to think about, but it sure seems presumptuous, not to mention I’m no politician.” He said. Dot smiled; her husband was most attractive when he tries new things. She stopped at the door, curious of his response.

“…………………………………………………………….”

“Well I’m sure but”

“…………………………………………………………………………………………………………”

“I couldn’t possibly, tha…”

“….”

“Please, we’re civilized men”

Dot was confus-

“………….͏̲̫̭̘͈͓͇.̷̼͖͕̗̝ͅ.̞͙̫.̟̟.̬͈̪̖̻̤̬.̵͇̘̺.̡ͅ ………………………….̛͇̼̞̫̞̞.̲͙̻̻̪͈͝.̯̮͕̥.̵.̱̳̥͕̞̠.̨̩̝.͈̫͇̥͘...̙̖͉͇͚̕.͖͚̝̩̮.͏̜̙̠̥̟.͎̣̥̙ͅ.͔̗̹.̝͇̫̙͓̞.̱̜͈͍̳̜͟.̖͉̮͔̮̻̘………………..͉̮̭.͙͙..͔̙͚͓.͉͚͓͍͓͔̼.͏̣͖.̯̖̰̖̮̦̠.̻͈͚̪͚̺.͞.̻͎.͍̱͖.̼̞ͅ…….̤̖̹͚̼.̬͖̺̥̦̭..̳͖.̝.̜̙̰͎.̢̞.̤̬͚.̗͚̪͕͓̥.͚̥͓ͅ.̸͔͍̜̼̝̥̦.̸͈.̛͎.̷̮͍̮͕͔…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….̫̣͡.̖̟̜.̻͕̫.̪͚̬̗.̘.̵͔̤̙ͅ.̥̫͙.͚͟.̲̺ͅ.̡͔̖.̵̻̥̹.̜͈̗̫̹͇͝..̮̻.̻̤.̪̹̯͍͇ͅ.̪̺.̖.͍̩.̤͈̳͉̦.͓͔.̘͔.̝͎̰.̡̝̠.͖̠̳͎͇̠̪.͇͇.̘͕̤̺ ………………………………………..”

“I meant no disrespect”

Dot peeked into the room. As expected, Austin was alone. A harsh glow came from nowhere in the room, the shadows were back and bolder. Austin was looking at the door.

“That’s my wife. Isn’t she beautiful?

“.͏̲̫̭̘͈͓͇.̷̼͖͕̗̝ͅ..̞͙̫.̟̟.̬͈̪̖̻̤̬”

“No problem” Austin grabs a glass stirring rod with two hands and places the center at the edge of the table before pushing at both ends with his hands, breaking it into two hateful pieces. He looks at them and offers one to Dot.

“I’m ready to go when you are” he smiles, those big, brown eyes warming like a chocolate chip cookie. Dot looks at his offer “Ho… Honey, that’s no-“

Austin gouged his face.

…”.”

The employees of Olympus came back to a crime scene. Police and CSI crawled from tip to tail of the building swabbing, cataloguing, and taking pictures of the inhuman amount of blood and viscera. A couple of the Olympus staff saw a man that looked like a cheap TV psychic waving what looked a piece of driftwood garnished with gold leaf. And whispering something in what was maybe Latin. The police hardly spoke, none of them knew how to express what was found.

“…inseparable…”

“…Too much…”

“…heap…”

“…Pile…”

“…nest…”

“…Body.”

[ ](https://imgur.com/irKmKcd)

The video was finished. Roy and Willy slid up the wall, stalked towards the Woman, who lay between two pillars. Roy took out a chipped pocketknife while the lust in the Willy’s eyes gave off the distinct impression that ritual sacrifice wouldn’t be the only atrocity he would commit that night. The minimal light twisted them, made them look much older, much crueler.

“What if I cut off her tit? Maybe save a nice little souvenir, what do you think?” Said Willly

“Maybe save it for later. It’s the least you guys could do after completely and totally ignoring me.”

They advanced.

Roy felt ten fingers sink under his collarbone and pull him onto his back. The fingers were thin and boney.

“Okay, fine, I won’t, you…you…fucking idiot stupid head.” Said Willy before Gregor got to him.

Gregor opened his mouth to say something but decided that Willy didn’t deserve his effort.

“Jesus, you always have to ruin our fun!” Said Roy as he tried to stab Gregor. But Roy was unsuccessful because Gregor dodged out of the way just in time for the imp-like boy to tumble to the patchwork of linoleum and concrete.

“GOD! You are the worst. All I want is for things to go my way and you won’t even let that happen.” Roy cried from the ground.

“Look footstool, I don’t want to do the Call To either, but John will do a lot worse than stab us if we don’t help him.

While that was happening, Ratface dragged the only chair between the two pillars, leaving it in the center of the dingy, sulfurous room. It was hard to make out shapes in the the room. Red dust drifted around and ate what little light there was. Then he began to take out the candles each boy had brought. No two were the same, different sizes, shape, color, or scent:

_They will do nicely._

He thought. He arranged them in a circle, with its edges touching the two pillars at either end of the center of the room, leaving a gap for the woman to be dragged through. As he was instructed, Ratface told Merrick to stop looking at the woman and drag her into the circle

“g-go put her in the chair”

“But she’s too heavy.” Merrick whined.

Ratface didn’t know what to say. As John’s best friend, the other boys always listened to him, or they faced John’s wrath.

Merrick beckoned John to help. The back of John’s hand left an even red mark on Merricks’s already ripe face. The chubby boy started to cry.

“Why are you so awful?!!? We’re supposed to be friends!” Was all the boys could make out before Merrick fell to the ground and blubbered incoherently.

Gregor groaned, then took it upon himself to drag her into the chair. It took several minutes and multiple candle displacements before she was comfortably in the cold angular chair. Because of the work and the boys’ poor physical shape, the room soon grew damp with sweat. Sticky, musty, humid. The outline of their backs showed dark through their polyester and cotton shirts. A damp hell.

As the candle circle was closed, John took Roy’s knife and dragged it across Merrick’s back. Merrick’s wet eyes flipped to his back, teeth bared, until he saw John’s blood soaked glean, then he turned back around. John was shaking as he collected his friend’s blood in a cheap plastic bowl. Every other boy got the same treatment, himself excluded. The blood was used to draw vaguely pagan, vaguely Christian symbols. By the end, the room smelled of grubby hands clutching pennies.

The women was lucid now.

[ ](https://imgur.com/DkuamG7)

“Do not worry, you are going to a better place. Your life will not be in vain, I promise,” grinned Beliel.

Ratface, looking expectantly at John, began to pour rock salt over and around the candles. The trail of white mineral was haphazard, slinking over and through with no continuity or purpose. By the end of his task, he had run out of salt, so he smeared the excess from the beginning of the footsteps of salt so that it connected. Several candles were shifted in doing so. Then Ratface started to light the fingers of wax. By the seventh one, the others joined in, using the burning sticks to light their dead brethren. The hot wax sloshed and dripped onto their hands, shoes, the floor, and the burning flames causing wincing and sputters to echo throughout the room. The room grew steamy as the candles were lit, with each extra finger, more and more sweat seeped from the pores of the humans in the room. Then, the aleatoric chanting began, each boy unsure of pronunciation and vocabulary. It didn’t help that the chant was created more to sound scary than to be functional. It sounded like someone had picked the words carte blanche from a dozen languages.

The Woman woke up to see them circling her as the chanting’s fervor rose. Then, just as it reached its peak, they stepped beside her. The chants were interrupted as they squabbled over the knife. They reached an agreement. She braced herself for the blow, bones were crunched and cracked and spilled marrow, but she felt no pain, and at first, she thought adrenaline had stopped the pain but there wasn’t even the sensation of touch to corroborate what her eyes saw.

Flesh began to shred and crack, bones began to bend and rip.

A wave of icy heat killed all but seven of the candles. The boys began to scream. She could hear them skitter to the door, followed by the door handle being accosted. Slowly, deliberately, steps could be heard from behind her.

The only voice not shouting for freedom was Joh .

_Why is that_ she thought. She tried to look behind her, but the shadows hid their master. They weren’t wholly successful; through the ripped bloody clothing she could see putrefied skin. A mint of vile color. The greens and yellows were reminiscent of a summer’s day, stuck inside while your sinuses leaked pestilent mucus and your while stomach gives a gift of bile into onto your sweaty body, all mixing into one divine scent. The green and yellow drizzled over, under and through, the perfectly charred flesh, like a chimichurri on steak. Solidified chunks of green and yellow added to the allure, as if to prove that the sauce was unprocessed, hand-made, none of that store-bought garbage. The skin was delightfully crisp, some parts lifting off the muscle and with large patches long since consumed, letting the woman make eye contact with a hateful eye deep in the steak.

The chair slammed the ground, the Woman’s head and left hand took the brunt of the force. The pain woke her up, nothing like percussive maintenance to get the ducks in a row. She was now afforded a view of the boys. Merrick was in the back, his girth prevented him from slipping to the front of the five person mosh-pit. John’s deliberate steps stopped, and so Merrick faced his former friend. He tried to back up, but with everyone packed in there was no room.

What entered her view was a far cry from the former boy. What little she could see was deliciously twisted, he looked as if the finest wagyu and calamari laid to rest on a corpse took on the cadaver’s villainous air. Merrick was enraptured; he wasn’t afforded the clarity of the protective circle. Before him stood his friend, with a platter of food outstretched in his left hand, with wide arms and smiles. Grapes, cheese, cured meats, minced Turkish apricots, pickled olives, sliced apples, all in a brilliant display of decadence. How could anyone R̵̡̖͑͠ḛ̴̞͠s̶̲͙̋̅ī̷͕͚s̷̮̖͋͝t̵̰̅̋?̴͙̻̎̈́?

The Woman saw the most beautiful smile take over the chubby boy’s face, an image of renaissance cherubic joy. He charged at his former friend eyes closed and arms open. The left hand of the beast came down on the large boys back, where the former arm touched the shirt melted. The two boys’ skin began to sizzle and pop, before settling into a fleshy moon-like surface. Sateene’s left hand began to slither through Merrick’s back, leaving a trail of ruin and chimichurri. It stopped at the elbow making a claw of flesh. The Fat one’s size served to protect the creature, he was to anchor the beast to the earth and its fleshy pleasures.

Ratface and Gregor turned, by the horror’s volition. The former saw as a walking corpse, the latter saw himself, tall and proud. They walked to it. It grabbed Ratface from behind the head at the base of the neck. His jaw

[ ](https://imgur.com/5usgDD5)

His eyes disappeared as the skin melted and crisped. He became the right arm, and his mouth became the hand, to reach for what it desires and destroy it. Gregor was given the place of honor on its shoulders. As his thighs covered the former heads of John and Merrick, they needed to move. The two heads dived headfirst into and up Gregor’s body. Flesh moved and bone rent. Gregor’s skeleton, finally relented, leaving him fleshier than ever before. Soon the shameful heads of the villains joined Gregor on his shoulders. Like two pasties, rising from blood and ground bone. He looked down on the two former boys, now he was better, strong, more powerful then they.

The woman could do nothing. She was broken and helpless. There was no one in the world who could help her. The boys made sure of that.

Roy saw it for what it was. Finally, a way for him to give the world what it deserved. He unlocked the heavy blast door and submitted to it. Behind him a red sky gave a harsh spotlight to the act. The eldritch flesh accepted him. It tried to get to the woman too. But the one thing the boys had done right was ward off the woman. She was safe in her circle.

It beckoned her. Three bodies made up the massive rotund torso that supported the spindly top, at it’s top was a scorpion’s stinger with three mouths instead of stinger, far seeing and all seeing. At the its right arm was an unhinged jaw smooth-ish, cratered, shiny, and greasy. The upper right arm was a fused combination of two arms, red and craggy. The lower left arm split, opening and closing like a buttered lobster claw, dripping chimichurri. A slug like appendage was able to flop its way close to the circle. Big, brown eyes, like chocolate chip cookies begged her to j̨͙̜̠̝̝̺̗̑̓ͮ͋̂̈́ͫ̋̚͝o̺͖͎͙͇̬̙̺̐́ͣͨ͘í͉̹͉̟ͦͥ̓̿̈ͥ̂͝n̶̨̰̤͎͓̣͕̼͐̋̂,͖̲͓̰̱̬̥̰̊͐̿͆̏ͧ͌ ͮ̉̉ͯͮ҉̸̺̩͉d̜̘̿ͩͧ͌̉͗ͬ͘e̜̣̤̖͖̭͎͊͂͛͞ͅâ͚̺ͥ̐͐̆͟r̺̩̱̞̩̂ͧ̊͐ͅ?̶̢̞͖̩̭͋ͨͤ̿̀̊̈́̔


End file.
